Fleur stared at Luna in stunned silence.
She couldn't fathom why this strange Ravenclaw girl remained so unruffled in the midst of chaos, nor why she had stepped forward to help her at all.
Her gaze drifted sideways. Gabrielle and the other hostages taken from Hogwarts had already been safely retrieved; they were now facing off against the Durmstrang champion on the far platform.
"Please stand up and raise your wand, Miss Delacour."
The voice was soft, dreamy, almost sung. It tugged Fleur back to the present.
She lifted her eyes and met Luna's pale, unearthly blue gaze. There was something hypnotic in the way the girl spoke, something that made obedience feel perfectly natural.
Fleur rose without thinking, fingers tightening around her wand.
"Perfect," Luna said with a radiant, distant smile. "Now, if you could hold on just a little longer…"
The words had barely left her lips when a ripple of faint sapphire magic unfurled around them. It spread like silk in the wind, weaving a canopy of starlight and moonlight that swallowed the cold February air.
Fleur's breath caught. It was the exact same spell Dumbledore had interrupted in the Great Hall months ago—the one that had terrified the entire school.
Luna rose slowly into the air again, knees drawn up, arms loosely folded across her chest, eyes closed as though she were simply napping in the cradle of the night itself. A halo of silvery-white light bloomed from her skin, pulsing in time with a low, heartbeat-like thrum of magic.
"What… what is she planning?" Fleur whispered, throat raw.
"She told me to witness a miracle," she answered herself, voice trembling. "But how can anyone fix something even I can't touch?"
Don't be ridiculous, Fleur Delacour does not need saving.
She bit down hard on her lip until she tasted blood.
Then came the scream.
A piercing, inhuman wail tore through the air as black mist erupted from Gabrielle's small body—or rather, from whatever had taken her place. The mist twisted into dozens of screaming human faces that hurtled straight toward Fleur like a tidal wave of despair.
She had one heartbeat to react.
"BOOM!"
Crimson light detonated inside the oncoming darkness. The faces shattered, shrieking as they dissolved.
Fleur stood in the eye of the storm, chest heaving, wand blazing scarlet.
"I don't need rescuing," she snarled, more to herself than anyone else. "I'll reduce that filthy thing to ashes myself!"
"Ice Cage!"
She slashed her wand downward. Crystalline shards exploded from the possessed girl's feet, racing upward in jagged spears. They locked around the swirling blackness, freezing motion itself, climbing higher and higher until frost kissed the impostor's skin.
The thing inside Gabrielle roared, thrashing against its prison. Black tendrils lashed out, cracking the ice, but Fleur poured everything she had into the spell—more focus, more raw will than she had ever summoned in the pristine practice halls of Beauxbatons.
Ethan had orchestrated this nightmare, yes—but if the purpose was to force them to grow, then damn him, it was working.
Cracks spider-webbed across the cage.
Her wand vibrated violently in her sweating grip.
"No—no, hold—!"
The ice exploded outward in a glittering storm. Fleur was flung backward, slamming into the freezing water. Before she could scramble upright, the black mist surged toward her again, faster this time, a wall of screaming mouths.
She raised her wand, but there was no time—
A column of pure silver light crashed down from above.
The moonlight struck the mist like divine judgment. Where it touched, the darkness simply ceased to exist, evaporating with a sound like a thousand dying whispers.
Fleur stared, soaked and shaking.
High above the Black Lake, an impossibly perfect full moon hung in a sky that had not existed moments before. It glowed with a cold, bluish sheen, vast and flawless, descending slowly through a river of stars that now blanketed the heavens.
Luna floated at its center, bathed in that unearthly light, hair streaming like molten gold. She looked less like a fourth-year girl and more like some ancient lunar goddess who had stepped out of legend.
The moon left her embrace and drifted downward—gentle, inevitable—toward the thing wearing Gabrielle's face.
Every wisp of black mist that dared rise against it was crushed as easily as dead leaves.
Fleur sank to her knees in the shallow water, unable to look away. The light reflected in her wide silver eyes.
So this was the gap between them.
Not skill, not knowledge—this was something older, something that made the proud magic of Beauxbatons feel like children's sparks.
Cedric and Krum had stopped fighting entirely. Bruised and bleeding, they stared upward, mouths open, their rivalry forgotten.
In the stands, hundreds of telescopes clattered to the wooden benches as students lowered them, choosing naked eyes over lenses because no glass could do justice to what they were seeing.
A Muggle-born Hufflepuff whispered through tears, "I didn't know magic could be this beautiful…"
Silence fell, reverent and absolute.
The full moon reached the possessed girl.
Light burst outward in a perfect circle, rolling across the lake in a tide of silver and sapphire. Where it passed, the water glittered like shattered diamonds. Tiny motes of cool blue light danced upward, brushing against Fleur's outstretched fingers.
The sensation that followed was indescribable—every ache, every lingering trace of dark magic, every knot of fear simply washed away, as though her soul had been dipped in starlight.
Then came the final scream.
Black sludge poured from the impostor's ears, nose, mouth—thick, tar-like obscurial residue forced out by the relentless purity of the moon. It writhed in the air for one last heartbeat before the light consumed it utterly.
The body went limp and collapsed.
For a single unnoticed instant, a ripple of shadow passed beneath the platform—an unseen door opening and closing. When it was gone, Gabrielle lay there instead, breathing softly, peacefully asleep, unharmed.
The moon faded. The starlit sky dissolved like a dream at dawn. The ordinary grey February afternoon returned.
Luna drifted downward, suddenly small and human again, legs giving out the moment her feet touched the platform.
Fleur lunged forward to catch her—only to freeze as someone else got there first.
Ethan Vincent appeared as if he'd simply stepped out of thin air. He caught Luna effortlessly, letting her slump against his chest. For once, the usual mocking curve of his mouth was absent; something almost gentle softened his sharp features as he brushed a strand of golden hair from her face.
"Well done, little moon," he murmured, so quietly only Luna—and perhaps Fleur—could hear. "You were magnificent."
In his other hand he held the glass dome containing Gabrielle's rose, perfectly intact.
His gaze lifted, sweeping over the exhausted champions, the stunned crowd, and finally settling on Fleur with lazy amusement.
"Time's up," he announced, voice carrying clearly across the water without any charm at all.
"I declare the second task of the Triwizard Tournament officially over!"
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